


Dream As If You'll Live Forever

by DeltaIV



Category: The Old Guard (Comics)
Genre: Dreams, F/F, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:26:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28146816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DeltaIV/pseuds/DeltaIV
Summary: They all dream of the same people, but what they see is entirely different.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia & Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani & Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 3
Kudos: 17
Collections: Yuletide 2020





	Dream As If You'll Live Forever

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wenwen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wenwen/gifts).



> I'm fascinated by the idea that they dream of one another before they meet, and by what they might see, so I thought I'd explore that a bit. I hope you have a happy yuletide, wenwen!

Noriko knows exactly when to come back. She's been waiting for the perfect time and when the dreams start again, she knows that's it. 

For a thousand years, the only person keeping her company had been Andromache. At night, in her dreams, there was Andromache. Then Andy and Lykon. She could _feel_ Andy's relief at finally having company, finally being not alone. She seemed happy. But Noriko couldn't figure out why she'd gone and found Lykon but hadn't bothered to come and find her. She'd been doing her best to find Andy, but she couldn't see any indication Andy was doing the same. It's why she ended up literally baking to death on the steppe. Everything was just so pointless, even if Andy actually existed. If she was meant to know Andromache was alive, too, then why was getting to her so damn impossible?

But then Andy had been the one to find her, convince her to live again, and they threw themselves into battle, into the world, side by side. She was sure that was how things were supposed to be after all. 

Until she went over the side of the boat and Andy left her there to die. Sure, the ocean was VAST, but Andy _knew_ she couldn't die. It took her ages to actually get to the surface, finding a boat, then land, took more lifetimes than she could count. Through it all, she didn't even have dreams of Andy to keep her company. Just--nothing. 

Which was fine. Andy left her in the ocean, that was a pretty clear message, Noriko didn't need to be told twice. She'd come out of the water very clear in her purpose. Embracing the side of life Nicky argued against was easier without any of them. 

When Booker showed up, she wondered briefly if that was her cue. But Andy didn't seem all that changed by his presence, and Booker himself certainly wasn't happy. So she waited. Andy sure as hell hadn't--she'd been at Booker's side within the year. And when Nile woke up, the cavalry showed up before the woman had a chance to even grasp what had happened, much less wonder if she was alone--within a week. 

Apparently Noriko was the only one Andy ever made wait. 

But when she sees Andy again--for the first time since she'd been stranded in the ocean--through Nile's eyes, reassuring her and answering questions, Noriko knows the waiting's over. 

* * *

The man just refuses to die! Nicolo's killed him three times now, and yet still he rises. 

It's easier to focus on the frustration than the confusion. Because the man's a tenacious fighter, and Nicolo's died three times, too, and he has no idea why. If he stops to ponder that too long, he'll just be dead faster. 

Time seems to stop as they take their frustration out on one another, it's a very bloody back and forth, and round about the fifth or sixth time Nicolo regains consciousness, he starts rising more slowly.

Not only because he's running out of ways to kill the man, but because he's started to--hallucinate? dream? It's unclear, but he's seeing _something_.

And it's something beautiful. 

Well, it's still war, and war isn't beautiful, but the _warriors_ , now _they're_ beautiful.

It's not so much their looks, though they're perfectly lovely, it's the way they fight. Together. Like they're two parts of one whole. Most of the time he's watching from outside of them, seeing the way they use one another in the fight without even speaking. 

But for part of the time he's in Andromache's mind, he's sure of it. A thrill runs through him when Noriko shouts her name, and he appreciates the grace with which she swings her sword much more with Andromache's admiration and lust mixed in. They are old partners, lovers, he's sure of that, too. 

When he watches Noriko fall beneath a well-timed blow, and feels Andromache's chest cave in while she's distracted, he fears for only a moment that he's watching the end of something so holy (love can't be anything but), but that's not how this story ends. He's somehow not surprised when they rise again. Just like him and the dark haired idiot who can't stay down.

"You looked worried!" Noriko calls with a grin. "You're not getting rid of me that easy."

"You're not getting rid of me at all," Andromache replies. They dust one another off, Andromache hands Noriko another sword, and Nicolo gets pulled back to the war _he_ continues to fight even after he dies.

He begins to wonder if this is all there is. Him, the dark haired man, their swords, and blood; death.

But several rounds later (he loses a _hand_ , which answers that question when he wakes up with two; gets slashed across the abdomen, again; and has his throat opened up--he'd like to avoid repeating that one if at all possible), he's decided to let himself enjoy the time spent horizontal a little bit longer. Fighting is always exhausting, but they're working on day three now. Four? Time has no meaning any longer. 

What he sees this time is both shocking and yet still feels inevitable. Andromache and Noriko have finished their battle. First he sees them at a river, rinsing the blood off their skin, out of their hair and their clothes. All he feels is safety and relief as Andromache teases Noriko about not liking the cold water. 

Then they're warm and dry, sitting by a fire as they eat. The meat is delicious, though Nicolo's not familiar with the flavor. The wine they drink is less so, but the feeling of victory and the softness they have for one another more than makes up for it. He realizes after a moment they're talking about a different war--one Andromache fought in. No, helped avoid? He's not entirely sure, though he sees Noriko's jealousy flare in her eyes at the name Cleopatra--

That's what throws him back into his own body, the sudden realization that those women, the two who can't die either, aren't his contemporaries. They're much, much older. Which means all this killing and not dying he and the dark haired man are doing is...futile. Pointless. Just violence for violence's sake, and he's never been a proponent of that. The only way the violence ends is if they end it themselves. 

He's the one to call for a halt first. 

* * *

Three days of dying is a lot, even if the first couple of times take a while. Booker's not been in a similar situation since then, for which he's glad. The memories of that death, those days-- freezing, starving, passing out until he died, reviving, passing out, again and again on end--are forever entwined with the dreams he had. Because somewhere between passing out and dying again, he would dream. 

None of it made much sense. Eventually he caught glimpse of an officer in dress blues, and a flag behind him. The blue uniforms he'd been seeing weren't Napoleon's men, they were Swedish, men preparing for war. This wasn't a memory. What it actually was, he couldn't say. 

The mystery gave him something to focus on, at the very least. He was glad for it, because otherwise he'd be fixated on how he wasn't dying--or rather, wasn't staying dead--and how the army really should move the fuck on before he gave himself away grabbing at a crow. 

But he didn't know why he wasn't staying dead, couldn't imagine anyone else would, and beyond that couldn't fathom the men who'd just hung him ever just clapping him on the back and letting him walk away if he just climbed on down. Assuming he could, in fact, get down. His arms were tied behind his back, so that would prove...interesting. 

So he stayed up there, not staying dead, plotting the next crow's murder, and dreaming. 

Sometimes he wishes he hadn't.

Most of what he saw was just Nicolo and Yusuf. Nicolo and Yusuf at dinner, charming everyone within earshot. Nicolo and Yusuf in their chambers, lounging in elaborate outfits and contemplating one another. Nicolo and Yusuf in considerably less clothing, sleeping (And not sleeping--briefly; Andy's abrupt about-face at the eyeful she got of them before she was even fully in the room had taken her, and therefore Booker, back into the hall). Nicolo and Yusuf laughing over breakfast, Nicolo studiously bent over a book, Yusuf hunched over his own notebook stealing glances at Nicolo while the other man worked, the contentment, the _love_ was impossible to miss. 

It's not the images that were the problem; they were sweet and clearly the men were in love.

No, the problem was him, watching. 

Or rather: Andy, watching. 

Every smile one sent the other was like a knife in her heart, each laugh at kick to her gut. There was a soft layer of happiness for both men in general, but when she saw them together-- intimately, smiling from across the room, even just in close proximity--it was like a massive black canyon of despair opened up inside of her chest, a great roaring silence that enveloped everything around her. There was envy, yes, but not jealousy. But above all, grief. An old grief, but one that felt as fresh and sharp as if it were new.

The loss she was feeling was too great for him to bear. 

And yet he kept dreaming it, living it. Over and over. 

Her loneliness in the middle of Swedish society, people everywhere, even people she loved who clearly loved her, was far too familiar to Booker. Yet his own pain was but a shard of Andy's.

Because she'd had what Nicolo and Yusuf had. She'd _had_ it.

And yet somehow, it was gone. Forever.

Seeing her die, dying with her, brought him no relief. 

Because she couldn't stay dead either. 

Even before his feet hit the ground and he could start finally getting the fuck out of Russia, Booker knew that kind of pain was what awaited him as soon as he could get an hour of continuous consciousness. Life was already miserable; he'd been fairly certain his desertion would be met with a bullet in his back, and he'd been fine with that. But now he can't die, and there's no escape. Three days of Andy's misery had made that perfectly clear. 

* * *

She's not dead.

She'd been pretty sure she was dying--she'd been so cold, and Dizzy looked too freaked out for anything else--but she's not dead. She can hear the beep of the monitor next to her bed, and the nurse has made her wake up every couple of hours.

It's the only way she knows she's dreaming, because the dream is _very_ vivid. But every time she's pulled back into the med tent, she's reminded; she can't forget the look in Dizzy's eyes. First the terror and acceptance as Nile bled out, and then the suspicion and confusion at her complete lack of wound. Something's weird, obviously, but she's not sure she wants to know what it is exactly. 

Sleep is a pretty good alternative to trying to figure that out. 

The dreams are, at the very least, distracting. 

She doesn't quite realize it's other people--that she's completely missing from her own dreams--at first. They're on some mission, infiltrating a base; the kind of thing Nile's done a million times in training, not all that different from what she does now. Well, there aren't civilians, but the teamwork, the communication that doesn't require words, the way all four of them move around each other without missing a beat, that's what she loves best about her job. Knowing what she's got to do, and doing it, with people she trusts--who trust _her_ \-- at her back. So it's a familiar feeling. 

But then she sees them fight. 

It is _clearly_ not her team. They move like one, extremely well-trained, well-seasoned fighting machine. They leave gaps for one another without hesitation, knowing they'll be covered just as surely. Nile can't even recognize where half the moves come from, styles are blended so effortlessly. The weapons are a whole other story--who the hell uses an axe?

She's still in awe at the effortless way they plowed through the enemy when the nurse wakes her; still another 6 hours of observation to go, and man are they active with their observing. 

But Nile drifts off again, and this time it's later--she's missed something, clearly; they're acting like the mission was a failure. While the guys look frustrated and disappointed, the woman--the axe wielder, Andy--looks pissed. And completely done. Like, with people in general, for good. Nile doesn't quite get what's tipped her over the edge, but she's familiar with the impulse; her mom didn't raise her to give up like that, but she's had moments of doubt. 

It's not until the last dream that she understands. 

This one is stranger, it's from someone's point of view--it takes her a quick process of elimination glance around to realize it's Joe's. They're back outside the compound, the start of the mission. Everything has a vaguely soft, not quite linear edge to it--she's dreaming with him, his memory of the night. 

The infiltration is quick as before--there's a sense of confidence, trust, in Joe as he eliminates the lookouts: Nicky's there, watching his back. The love that fills him, even in the midst of the fighting, is impossible to mistake for anything else. 

Which makes the confusion, horror, and pain as he realizes they've walked into a brutal ambush even worse. He's not worried about himself or all the bullets ripping into him, he's worried about Nicky. It's the last thing he sees, the last thing Nile sees, before the whole dream goes dark. 

Nicky's also the first thing they see when sight slowly comes back. It's the back of his head, and Joe doesn't feel near the flood of relief that Nile does at the sight. There's still fear spiking through Joe, and it's not relieved until Nicky finally stirs, looks over. 

Slowly Nile realizes, the whole team is moving again. She can see wounds healing, even in the dim light. They're alive. Still. She saw them die, she could feel herself--Joe--die, but they're all climbing to their feet. And charging at the assholes who killed them. The relief, love, gratitude, and rage fill her to the brim, and the hand on Nile's arm has her jerking in surprise as the nurse pulls her back to consciousness. 

Everything in insane, she can't make sense of any of it. Those people were still alive. SHE was still alive. There wasn't even a scratch on her throat. The nurse looked at her warily, Dizzy's expression wouldn't leave Nile's mind. 

Something was weird, and she was pretty sure it was her. 

After the inescapable trust of the team, all that love, she feels even more alone, even more confused.

* * *

It's been an extremely long time since Andy's felt this way. Honestly, it's been a while since she's felt anything other than angry or numb, but this confusion is not welcome. 

There's only one reason she's ever tripped over for this kind of sensation--the conviction that she's gotta be dreaming because there's no way this is real. It's how she felt for the first several hundred years she dreamed of Noriko. 

So it doesn't take her long to put together that she's dreaming of someone; her own memories of that time are never this sharp, this immediate. Her brain dutifully tries to reject the idea that someone else is going through what she did, but then she's reliving the woman's death and it's kind of a moot point. The woman definitely dies, definitely wakes up again, and is definitely confused.

There is definitely another one of them. 

God _dammit_.

She wakes up. So do the boys. 

The rage that boils up suddenly surges through her--she was _done_ with this shit, no way was she going through all this AGAIN, NOW. No. 

Just. 

No.

...   
... ...

Except. 

Except the boys start talking, asking each other questions. Like they'd done this before. Like they knew exactly what it meant and were _okay_ with it, maybe even a little excited about it. Then they turn to her. They always do. 

Saying no doesn't work. Trying to steer them back onto the road of self-preservation is a non-starter. Nicky looks disappointed, and even Booker's joined in on the detail excavation like he doesn't understand that she's trying to keep things from getting worse. 

It's when Joe reminds her how awful the confusion, the horror of being alone, the fear all were that she's willing to recognize she's on the losing end of this argument. She hates being alone more than anything; she's not gonna make this woman suffer through it on her own. Joe _knows_ that. So does Andy.

And like that, she's got another one. 

She doesn't get to be done with the world just yet.


End file.
